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THINGS 


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3   553 


ALICE  DUER  MILLER 


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Mary  Raymond  Shipman  Andrews 
The  Perfect  Tribute 
The  Lifted  Bandage 
The  Courage  of 

the  Commonplace 
The  Counsel  Assigned 

Maltbie  Davenport  Babcock 

The  Success  of  Defeat 

Katharine  Holland  Brown 
The  Messenger 

Richard  Harding  Davis 
The  Consul 

Marion  Harland 

Looking  Westward 

Robert  Herrick 

The  Master  of  the  Inn 

Frederick  Landis 

The  Angel  of  Lonesome  Hill 

Francis  E.  Leupp 

A  Day  with  Father 

Alice  Duer  Miller 
Things 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson 

A  Christmas  Sermon 
Prayers  Written  at  Vailima 
Aes  Triplex 

Isobel  Strong 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson 

Henry  van  Dyke 

School  of  Life 

The  Spirit  of  Christmas 


THINGS 


THINGS 


BY 

Alice   Duer   Miller 

Author  of  "  The  Blue  Arch,"  "  Calderon'i 
Prisoner,"  etc. 


NEW  YORK 

Charles  Scribner's  Sons 
1914 


THINGS 


BY 

Alice   Duer   Miller 

Author  of  "  The  Blue  Arch,"  "  Calderon's 
Prisoner,"  etc. 


NEW  YORK 

Charles  Scribner's  Sons 
1914 


1 


Copyright,  1914,  fr?/  Charles  Scribner's  Sons 


Published  April,  1914 


;// 


THINGS 


THINGS 


THE  great  alienist  sat  down  at 
his  desk,  and  having  emptied 
his  mind  of  all  other  impres 
sions,  held  it  up  like  a  dipper  for  his 
new  patient  to  fill.  Large,  blond, 
and  handsome,  she  was  plainly  ac 
customed  to  being  listened  to.  Be 
fore  she  had  fairly  undone  her  furs 
and  folded  her  hands  within  her 
muff,  the  doctor's  lateral  vision  had 
told  him  that,  whatever  her  prob 
lems,  it  wras  not  about  her  own  ner 
vous  system  that  she  had  come  to 
consult  him. 

Not  too    quickly  her  story  began 
[3] 


M121343 


THINGS 


to  take  shape.  Her  household,  her 
husband,  her  four  children — three 
small  boys  and  an  older  daughter,  a 
girl  of  seventeen  .  .  . 

"My  only  thought  has  been  my 
children,  Dr.  Despard." 

"Your  only  thought,  Mrs.  Royce?" 

She  assented.  The  daughter  was 
the  problem — the  daughter  of  sev 
enteen. 

"She  and  I  have  been  such  friends; 
I  have  always  been  a  friend  to  my 
children,  I  hope,  as  well  as  a  parent. 
And  Celia's  little  arrangements,  her 
clothes  and  her  small  parties,  have 
been  as  much  my  interests  as  hers 
— more,  perhaps.  The  bond  between 
us  has  been  peculiarly  close  until 
the  last  year  or  so.  Lately  a  rebel 
lious  spirit  has  begun  to  develop.  I 
have  tried  to  make  allowances,  but 

[4] 


THINGS 

naturally  there  are  certain  ques 
tions  of  manners  and  deportment- 
small  but  important — about  which 
one  cannot  yield.  I  am  almost 
ashamed  to  confess  how  unaffec- 
tionate  are  the  terms  that  we  have 
reached.  The  situation  w^ill  strike 
you  as  a  strange  one  between  a 
mother  and  daughter- 
He  shook  his  head.  "You  are  by 
no  means  the  only  mother  and 
daughter  whose  relations  are  unsat 
isfactory." 

"Ah,  the  young  people  of  to-day!" 
she  sighed.  "What  is  the  matter 
with  them,  with  the  age,  Dr.  Des- 
pard?  They  are  so  hard,  so  individ 
ualistic.  I  myself  was  one  of  a  large 
family,  and  we  lived  in  the  house 
with  my  grandparents  and  aunts. 
My  life  was  made  up  of  little  du- 

[5] 


THINGS 

ties  for  older  people — duties  I  never 
thought  of  questioning.  They  were 
a  pleasure  to  me.  But  if  I  ask  Celia 
to  go  on  an  errand  for  me — or  even 
to  attend  to  something  for  herself— 
I  am  met  by  the  look  of  a  martyr 
or  a  rebel.  But  that  is  not  the  worst. 
At  times,  Dr.  Despard,  her  language 
to  me  is  violent — is — actually  pro 
fane.  I  cannot  help  looking  on  this 
as  an  abnormal  manifestation.  At 
last  I  saw  her  case  was  pathological. 
No  nice  girl  swears  at  her  mother, 
and '  '•  —Mrs .  Roy ce  smiled—  •'  *  my 
daughter  is  a  nice  girl." 

It  seemed  to  him  that  Mrs.  Royce 
must  be  a  very  nice  mother  indeed. 
Soft,  serious,  and  eminently  mater 
nal,  she  appealed  profoundly  to  all 
his  bachelor  ideals. 

"And  your  husband?"   he  asked. 

[6] 


THINGS 

"How  does  he  get  on  with  his 
daughter?" 

"Admirably,"  she  returned  warmly; 
"they  hardly  see  each  other." 

He  glanced  quickly  at  her  to  see 
if  her  intention  were  humorous,  but 
something  mechanical  in  her  smile 
had  already  warned  him  that  her 
mind  wras  bent  on  other  of  life's  as 
pects  than  the  comic.  Now  she  wras 
quite  serious,  and  he  replied  with 
equal  gravity: 

"It  is  often  the  solution." 

They  decided,  at  length,  that  he 
was  to  spend  a  few  days  with  them 
in  the  country.  To  bring  the  girl  to 
his  office  would  be  useless.  He  would 
find  her  a  gentle,  well-behaved  little 
creature,  perhaps  too  much  inter 
ested  in  her  books.  The  exigencies 
of  the  children's  education  kept  the 

[7] 


THINGS 

Royces  in  town  during  the  week,  but 
they  spent  Saturday  and  Sunday  at 
the  old  Royce  place  on  the  Hudson. 
Here  Despard  promised  to  come  at 
the  first  opportunity. 

She  thanked  him,  and  held  out  a 
strong,  firm  hand. 

No,  he  thought  when  she  had  gone, 
he  could  not  understand  a  girl's 
swearing  at  such  a  mother — at  once 
so  affectionate  and  so  intelligent,  for, 
with  pardonable  egotism,  Despard 
reckoned  her  bringing  the  problem 
to  him  a  proof  of  rare  domestic  in 
telligence.  Most  women  would  have 
made  it  the  subject  of  anger  or 
tears. 

He  himself  held  no  special  brief 
for  youth.  The  younger  generation 
did  not  attract  him.  His  own  neph 
ews  and  nieces  never  made  him  re 
turn  disgusted  to  his  loneliness,  but 


THINGS 

rather  raised  his  enjoyment  of  his 
solitude. 

Before  he  admitted  his  next  pa 
tient  he  stood  a  moment  contemplat 
ing  the  sacrifices  made  by  a  parent. 
"It's  stupendous,  it's  too  much," 
he  thought;  and  smiled  to  think 
that,  if  he  had  married,  a  child  of 
his  might  now  be  conducting  him  to 
a  doctor's  office,  for  of  the  two  he 
would  undoubtedly  have  been  the 
first  to  swear. 

After  a  week  particularly  crowded 
with  the  concerns  of  other  people 
Despard  arrived,  at  high  noon  of  a 
day  in  early  April,  at  the  Royces' 
place.  Never,  he  thought,  had  he 
seen  peace  so  clearly  embodied.  A 
dense,  fresh  lawn  sloped  down  to 
the  hazy  river;  splendid  old  trees 
were  everywhere;  the  serious  stone 
house  had  been  built  with  the  sirn- 

[9] 


THINGS 

pie  notions  of  comfort  that  existed 
a  hundred  years  ago. 

Mr.  Royce,  who  met  him  at  the 
station,  seemed  a  peaceful  sort  of 
person,  too — a  man  whose  fore 
bears  had  been  more  like  fairy  god 
parents  than  ordinary  ancestors,  for 
they  had  given  him  a  handsome, 
healthy  body,  a  fair  fortune,  a  re 
spected  name,  and,  best  of  all,  an 
unquestioning  belief  in  all  the  insti 
tutions  of  his  own  time,  such  as 
matrimony,  the  ten  commandments, 
and  the  blessings  of  paternity. 

Despard  turned  the  conversation 
toward  the  daughter,  but  was  soon 
aware  that  he  was  getting  a  mere 
echo  of  Mrs.  Royce's  opinions. 

"The  child  has  worked  herself  into 
an  abnormal  frame  of  mind,"  said 
her  father. 

[10] 


THINGS 

"You  draw  this  from  your  own 
observations?" 

"Well,  more  from  her  mother's. 
I  leave  that  sort  of  thing  to  rny  wife. 
She  has  great  cares,  great  respon 
sibilities.  She  takes  life  almost  too 
seriously."  He  sighed.  The  next  in 
stant  his  face  lighted  up  in  pointing 
out  to  Despard  a  giant  chestnut- 
tree  just  saved  from  a  blighting  dis 
ease.  For  a  fewT  minutes  he  spoke 
on  the  subject  with  extraordinary 
vividness. 

Despard  was  quick  to  recognize 
expert  knowledge,  and  Royce,  with 
something  approaching  a  blush,  ad 
mitted  that  he  did  understand  the 
care  of  native  trees.  "I  have  some 
times  thought  of  writing  a  book 
about  it,"  he  said  timidly. 

"You  certainly  should." 
[Hi 


THINGS 

"Ah,  it's  so  difficult  to  find  time." 

Despard  smiled.  Who  had  leisure 
if  this  favored  being  had  not?  He 
himself,  without  one  hour  in  the 
twenty -four  that  he  could  call  his 
own,  was  already  at  work  on  his 
third. 

He  met  the  whole  family  assem 
bled  at  luncheon:  a  pale  German 
governess,  three  little  boys,  and  the 
dark-eyed  Celia,  sweet-mouthed  but 
sullen-browed. 

Despard,  who  had  had  no  break 
fast,  thought  more  than  he  would 
have  confessed  about  the  victuals 
set  before  him.  Any  family  ought 
to  be  amiable,  he  thought,  on  food 
at  once  so  simple  and  delicious. 
His  opinion  of  Mrs.  Royce  rose  still 
higher. 

Within  the  next  hour  he  came  to 


THINGS 

the  conclusion  that,  in  spite  of  his 
extended  knowledge  of  American 
interiors,  he  had  never  before  been 
in  a  really  well-appointed  house — a 
house,  that  is,  where  one  wise  and 
affectionate  person  directed  every 
detail.  Mrs.  Royce,  he  found,  knew 
every  aspect  of  her  home.  She  not 
only  knew  her  flowers  almost  as 
individuals,  but  she  knew  the  vase 
and  the  place  where  each  appeared 
to  the  best  advantage.  She  knew 
better  than  her  husband  which  chair 
he  liked,  where  he  kept  his  cigars, 
and  which  little  table  would  be  best 
at  his  elbow.  Nor  was  her  consid 
eration  confined  to  her  own  family. 
She  had  thought  of  a  tired  doctor's 
special  needs.  She  had  given  him 
"a  little  room,  where  he  could  be 
quiet  and  get  a  glimpse  of  the  river." 

[13] 


THINGS 

Shut  in  this  room,  not  so  very 
little  after  all,  he  walked  to  the  writ 
ing-table  to  make  a  memorandum. 
It  had  more  than  once  happened 
to  him  to  find,  in  a  house  accounted 
luxurious,  only  a  dry,  encrusted 
inkstand  in  the  spare  room.  Not  so 
here.  Never  was  ink  so  fluidly, 
greenly  new;  never  was  blotting- 
paper  so  eagerly  absorbent.  He  no 
ticed,  besides  three  sizes  of  paper 
and  envelopes,  that  there  were  ca 
ble  blanks,  telegraph  blanks,  and 
postal  cards,  as  well  as  stamps  of 
all  varieties. 

It  was  not  Despard's  habit  to  no 
tice  life  quite  as  much  in  detail  as 
this,  but  now  it  amused  him  to  pur 
sue  the  subject.  Luxury  he  knew; 
but  this  effective  consideration  he 
rated  as  something  higher. 


II 

HE  had  arrived  on  a  Friday,  and 
on  Sunday  at  five — things 
were  apt  to  happen  by  a 
schedule  in  the  Royce  household- 
he  was  to  give  his  report  on  Celia. 

He  entered  the  library — the  spot 
designated  by  Mrs.  Royce — by  one 
door  as  Churchley,  the  butler,  carne 
in  at  the  other  to  serve  tea. 

The  dark,  shining  little  table  was 
brought  out,  noiselessly  opened,  cov 
ered  with  a  cloth — the  wrong  cloth, 
Mrs.  Royce  indicated.  Churchley 
whisked  away  and  returned  incred 
ibly  quickly  with  the  right  one. 
The  tray,  weighted  with  silver  and 
blossoming  with  the  saffron  flame 

[15] 


THINGS 

of  the  tea-kettle,  was  next  put  be 
fore  her,  and  then  another  little 
structure  of  shelves  was  set  at  her 
right  hand.  Her  eye  fell  on  this. 

"I  said  brown-bread  toast,  Church- 
ley."  The  man  murmured  and  again 
whisked  away. 

All  this  time  Despard  had  not  sat 
down,  although  between  orders  Mrs. 
Royce  had  more  than  once  urged  him 
to  do  so.  He  stood,  having  shut  the 
door  behind  him,  leaning  the  point 
of  his  shoulder  against  the  wall. 

Utterly  undisturbed  by  his  calm 
eyes  fixed  upon  her,  Mrs.  Royce 
said: 

"Poor  Churchley,  he  has  been  with 
us  for  six  years,  but  I'm  afraid  I 
can't  keep  him.  He  forgets  every 
thing." 

"He's   on   the   edge   of   a   nervous 

[16] 


THINGS 

breakdown,"  answered  Despard 
coolly,  and  he  added:  "The  house 
maid  is  a  pronounced  neurasthenic. 
As  for  your  daughter— 

"Ah,  Celia,  poor,  dear  child!  Must 
we  send  her  away?"  her  mother 
asked,  but  before  the  doctor  had 
time  to  answer,  Churchley,  by  a 
miracle  of  celerity,  again  entered, 
this  time  bearing  toast  of  the  de 
sired  complexion. 

After  he  had  finally  disappeared, 
Mrs.  Royce  busied  herself  with  flame 
and  kettle  and  tea-caddy  before  she 
repeated  her  question,  and  her  voice 
had  in  it  a  faint  sediment  of  these 
preoccupations : 

"I  hope  you  do  not  think  it  neces 
sary  to  send  Celia  away,  Dr.  Des 
pard?" 

He  drew  a  chair  forward  and  sat 

[17] 


THINGS 

down.  "No,  Mrs.  Royce,"  he  said; 
"I  think  it  necessary  to  send  you 
away." 

"Me?" 

He  bowed. 

"But  my  health  is  excellent.  Oh, 
I  see,"  she  smiled.  "My  husband 
has  been  talking  to  you  about  my 
responsibilities.  Yes,  they  are  great, 
but  one  is  given  strength  to  do  what 
is  required  of  one.  I  shall  not  have 
to  desert  my  post.  I  am  strong." 

"I  know  you  are  strong,  Mrs. 
Royce,"  said  he,  "but  you  are  the 
cause  of  weakness  in  others.  We 
need  not  multiply  examples:  your 
daughter,  the  governess,  Church- 
ley- 

She  broke  in — "Of  course,  I  admit 
their  weakness.  But  don't  you  see 
how  I  protect  and  support  them? 

[18] 


THINGS 

How  could  you  imagine  that  I  was 
the  cause?" 

"Isn't  it  suggestive  that  practi 
cally  every  one  with  whom  you  come 
in  contact— 

"My  husband,"  she  retorted,  quot 
ing  an  instance  against  him. 

"Your  husband  has  great  natural 
calm,  and  spends  eight  hours  a  day 
out  of  the  house.  You  have  made 
this  home,  this  really  wonderful 
home,  for  those  you  love.  No  one 
admires  the  achievement  more  than 
I  do.  But  you  have  sacrificed  too 
much  of  yourself  in  doing  it;  and 
I'm  not  speaking  of  your  physical 
strength.  In  this  library,  in  which 
you  are  so  fond  of  sitting,  how  many 
books  have  you  ever  read?" 

"I  was  a  great  reader  as  a  girl," 
she  answered. 

[19] 


THINGS 

"Which  of  these  have  you  read  in 
the  last  ten  years?" 

She  murmured  that  he  perhaps 
'hardly  understood  the  demands  upon 
her  time. 

:<You  never  read.  You  can't,"  he 
returned.  "Since  my  first  hour 
here  I  have  been  watching  you,  not 
your  daughter.  Her  case  is  simple 
enough.  You  don't  read,  Mrs.  Royce, 
not  because  you  have  no  time,  but 
because  you  have  no  concentration. 
This  is  one  of  the  many  sacrifices 
you  have  made  to  your  household 
—a  serious  one,  and  we  must  face 
the  results.  I  have  watched  you  each 
day  carrying  the  morning  papers 
about  with  you  until  evening,  and 
then,  if  you  read  the  headlines,  it 
is  as  much  as  you  can  accomplish." 

She   had   been    staring   at   him   as 

[201 


THINGS 

though   in   a   trance,   but   now   she 
came  to,  with  a  laugh. 

"My  dear  Dr.  Despard,"  she  said, 
"if  you  were  the  mother  of  four 
children  and  the  head- 
He  held  up  his  hand.  "You  must 
let  me  finish,"  he  said.  "You  have 
made  this  home,  and  you  adminis 
ter  it  with  consummate  ability;  and 
yet  no  one  is  really  happy  in  it, 
least  of  all  yourself.  Why?  Well,  I 
need  not  remind  you  that  no  one  is 
made  happy  merely  by  things.  Some 
continuity  of  inner  life  is  absolutely 
necessary,  not  only  to  happiness 
but  to  health.  Remember,  I  am 
speaking  as  a  nerve  specialist.  You, 
Mrs.  Royce,  are  an  enemy  to  con 
tinuity.  You  dispel  concentration  as 
a  rock  dispels  a  wave.  Even  I  find 
no  little  difficulty,  when  in  your 
F211 


THINGS 

presence,  in  pursuing  a  consecutive 
train  of  thought,  and,  as  for  you 
yourself,  such  a  thing  has  long  been 
impossible  for  you.  Even  now,  on 
this  matter  so  immensely  important 
to  you,  you  have  not  been  able  to 
give  me  your  undivided  attention. 
Other  facts  have  kept  coming  up  in 
your  consciousness — that  a  bell  rang 
somewhere;  that  the  hearth  has  not 
been  swept  up.  Acutely  aware  as  I 
am  of  your  point  of  view,  these 
breaks  in  your  attention  have  been 
breaks  in  mine,  too ;  but  I  have  been 
able  to  overcome  them,  and  follow 
my  ideas  to  the  end,  because  I  have 
been  trained  to  do  so,  and,  besides, 
I've  been  here  only  two  days.  In 
two  days  more  I  would  not  answer 
for  myself.  I  should  begin  to  see 
things,  things,  things,  and  to  be- 

[22] 


THINGS 

lieve  that  all  life  was  merely  a  ques 
tion  of  arrangements.  Even  your  re 
ligion,  Mrs.  Royce,  in  which  most 
people  find  some  continuity,  is  a  ques 
tion  of  things — of  Sunday-schools  and 
altar  decoration.  That  poor  little 
clergyman  who  lunched  here  to-day 
—he  came  emanating  a  certain  spiri 
tual  peace ;  but  he  went  away  crushed 
by  your  poor  opinion  of  him  as  an  ex 
ecutive.  At  this  moment  he  is  prob 
ably  breaking  up  the  current  of  his 
life  by  a  conscientious  attention  to 
things." 

Deeply  protesting  as  she  was  in 
her  heart,  something  in  his  hard, 
clear  look  kept  her  silent,  and  he 
went  on: 

"Your  daughter  is — to  use  a  big 
word — an  intellectual.  For  the  time 
being  she  is  interested  only  in  things 

[23] 


THINGS 

of  the  mind.  New  ideas,  books,  po 
etry  are  the  great  adventures  of  life 
to  'her  at  present.  To  all  this  you 
are  an  obstructionist— 

:<  There,  at  least,  you  are  utterly 
at  fault,"  cried  the  poor  lady,  with 
a  passion  she  had  not  known  for 
years.  "I  have  done  everything  in 
my  power  to  help.  I  am  very  ambi 
tious  in  regard  to  my  children's  ed 
ucation.  Their  schools,  their  teach 
ers " 

"Ay,"  said  Despard,  "you  have 
set  out  the  counters  for  them  but 
you  have  never  let  them  play  the 
game.  You  were  interested  in  making 
the  arrangements,  but  you  had  no 
interest  at  all  in  the  state  of  mind 
which  could  take  advantage  of  them. 
Your  daughter  knows,  not  only  that 
you  take  no  thought  for  such  rnat- 

[24] 


THINGS 

ters  yourself,  but  that  every  phase 
of  your  contact  with  her  demands 
her  attention  for  other  matters- 
clothes,  manners,  hours,  and  dates. 
You  have  no  respect  for  her  preoc 
cupations.  Not  once,  not  twice,  but 
fifty  times  a  day,  you  interrupt  her, 
with  a  caress,  or  an  errand,  or  more 
often  a  reproof.  Yesterday,  when  she 
wras  obviously  absorbed  in  reading 
that  bit  of  verse  to  her  father,  you 
sent  her  up-stairs  to  change  her 
shoes— 

"They  were  wet;  she  would  have 
caught  cold." 

"If  you  had  listened  you  would 
have  seen  she  had  only  four  more 
lines  to  read.  You  do  all  this,  not 
only  when  she  is  in  your  domain,  at 
meals  and  in  the  drawing-room,  but 
you  follow  her  to  her  own  room  and 

[25] 


THINGS 

go  in  without  knocking.  I  venture  to 
say  that  that  child  works  at  night, 
for  the  simple  reason  that  to  work 
in  this  house  during  the  daytime  is 
impossible." 

"Really,"  said  Mrs.  Royce,  "with 
the  best  will  in  the  world  I  do  not 
understand  you.  Celia's  friends  some 
times  seem  to  feel  that  I  ought  to 
neglect  her  manners  and  pronun 
ciation,  ought  to  allow  her  to  be 
come  selfish  and  self-centred,  so 
that  she  may—  '  She  broke  off  as 
if  words  failed  her.  "But  I  have 
never  heard  a  grown  person  suggest 
that  such  a  course  would  be  right." 

"Ask  your  clergyman  what  is 
right,"  answered  Despard.  "I  am 
here  to  tell  you  what  is  healthy;  I 
am  here  to  prescribe.  Now,  notice, 
please,  I  do  not  tell  you  to  change. 

[26] 


THINGS 

I  don't  think  you  could.  The  re 
actions  have  taken  place  too  many 
times.  I  tell  you  to  go  away.  We 
can  call  it  a  rest  cure.  You  shall  have 
beautiful  surroundings,  comfort,  and, 
above  all  that  leisure  that  recent 
years  have  failed  to  give  you.  In 
return  I  shall  ask  you  to  concen 
trate  your  mind  for  a  certain  num 
ber  of  hours  each  day." 

"You  talk,"  she  cried  bitterly,  "as 
if  I  enjoyed  the  treadmill  of  my  daily 
life." 

"You  have  unusual  executive  abil 
ity,  and, most  of  us  enjoy  the  use  of 
our  powers." 

"The  best  refutation  of  all  that 
you  have  said  is  that  I  am  eager  to 
go,"  she  returned.  "Ah,  I  cannot 
tell  you  how  inviting  such  a  prospect 
seems  to  me — not  to  order  dinner, 

[27] 


THINGS 

not  to  have  to  decide  and  arrange  for 
every  one,  not  to  be  the  pivot  of  the 
whole  structure.  Ah,  Dr.  Despard, 
I  would  so  gladly  go,  but 

"But?" 

"But  what  would  happen  to  my 
family  without  me?" 

"They  must  try  looking  out  for 
themselves,"  he  answered.  He  glanced 
at  his  watch,  for  he  was  to  take  a 
train  that  afternoon;  and  Mrs.  Royce 
collected  herself  enough  to  touch  the 
bell — it  always  hung  within  tempting 
reach  of  her  hand — and  gave  Church- 
ley  orders  to  send  for  the  motor  and 
have  the  doctor's  bags  brought  down. 

During  this  interval  Despard  walked 
to  the  window  and  stood  looking  out. 
It  is  not  always  so  easy  to  apply  the 
knife  psychologically  as  physically. 
He  wondered  if  he  could  have  been 

[28] 


THINGS 

more  gentle  and  equally  effective. 
As  he  stood  there  Celia  came  saun 
tering  across  the  lawn,  her  head  bent, 
her  hands  deep  in  the  pockets  of  an 
enveloping  dun -colored  coat.  The 
brow  which  had  first  seemed  sulky  to 
him  appeared  now  simply  thoughtful. 


[29] 


Ill 

THE  strength  of  Mrs.  Royce's 
character  was  shown  by  the 
fact  that  she  obeyed — she  ac 
tually  went.  She  went  almost  gladly 

—a  state  of  mind  induced  by  the  ex 
traordinary  activity  of  her  last  days 
at  home.  In  one  brilliant  flash  of 
prophecy  and  power  she  foresaw 
and  forestalled  every  contingency 
that  could  arise  in  her  absence.  She 
departed  in  a  condition  of  exhaustion 
fully  justifying  the  doctor's  story  of 
a  needed  rest. 

Her  weariness  lasted  through  the 
first  few  days  at  the  sanatorium.  She 
was  well  content  to  lie  in  bed  and 

[301 


THINGS 

think  of  nothing.  But  by  the  fifth  or 
sixth  day  she  began  to  wonder  where 
she  had  left  the  key  of  the  cedar 
closet;  and  several  possibilities  of 
error  in  the  arrangements  she  had 
made  to  reach  from  garret  to  cellar 
began  to  creep  into  her  consciousness. 
Her  elder  boy  was  subject  to  throat 
trouble;  her  younger  was  subtly 
averse  to  bathing.  She  had  not,  per 
haps,  sufficiently  emphasized  these 
two  dangers.  She  had,  however, 
given  her  promise  not  to  communi 
cate  with  her  household  except  in 
case  of  necessity. 

Conscientious  in  her  determination 
to  do  what  she  had  set  out  to  do,  she 
took  out  some  of  the  books  she  had 
brought  with  her,  but  they  seemed  an 
unsatisfactory  lot:  the  novels,  trashy; 
the  essays,  dull;  the  history,  heavy. 

[311 


THINGS 

Strange,  she  thought,  how  people  will 
recommend  books  which  really  did 
not  even  hold  one's  attention. 

The  word  attention,  bringing  with  it 
the  recollection  of  Despard's  speech, 
recalled  her  to  her  obligations.  Heavy 
or  not,  she  was  resolved  to  make  her 
way  through  the  volume. 

She  read:  "It  has  been  argued  that 
the  too  rapid  introduction  of  mod 
ern  political  machinery,  and  the  too 
rapid  unification  of  such  different 
populations  as  those—  Had  she 
told  them  not  to  keep  the  house 
too  hot  in  these  first  spring  days? 
Overheated  houses,  in  her  opinion, 
were  a  fruitful  source  of  ill  health, 
-though  these  may  with  more 
justice  be  ascribed  to  deep-seated 
sociological  causes  stretching  back 
through  two  thousand  years—  '  This 

[32] 


THINGS 

was  the  season  for  putting  away  the 
furs.  If,  in  her  absence,  moths  should 
attack  her  husband's  sable-lined  over 
coat!  Ah,  she  put  down  her  book; 
this  was  serious. 

Fifteen  minutes  later  she  went  out, 
trying  to  walk  off  the  haunting  pres 
ence  of  that  fur  coat. 

There  was  something  not  a  little 
heroic  in  her  struggle  with  tempta 
tions — staying  on  while  every  notion 
she  had  heretofore  considered  right 
eous  called  to  her  to  go  back.  Hide 
ous  pictures  of  ruin  and  discomfort 
at  home  floated  before  her  mind. 
She  had  to  admit  she  found  a  cer 
tain  grim  satisfaction  in  such  visions. 
They  would  at  least  prove  to  Des- 
pard  how  little  the  modern  family  is 
able  to  dispense  with  the  services  of 
the  old-fashioned  mother. 

[331 


THINGS 

She  was  human  enough  to  be  eager 
to  prove  him  wrong  in  essentials,  for 
in  minor  matters  he  had  shown  him 
self  terribly  accurate.  With  unlimited 
leisure  on  her  hands  she  was  surprised 
to  find  how  little  enjoyment  she  de 
rived  from  her  books.  She  read  her 
self  to  sleep  with  a  novel  every  night, 
but  it  was  enough  for  her  to  open  one 
of  the  more  serious  works  for  her 
mind  to  rush  back  to  the  old  domes 
tic  problems.  Her  eyes  alone  would 
read  the  printed  page. 

Her  life  seemed  hideously  vacant — 
empty,  as  she  put  it,  of  all  affection; 
but  it  was  also  empty  of  all  machin 
ery — perhaps  the  greater  change  of 
the  two.  She  had  no  small  duties, 
no  orders  to  give,  no  mistakes  to 
correct. 

She  was  not  forbidden  to  communi- 

[341 


THINGS 

cate  with  Despard,  and  at  the  end  of 
a  week  she  telegraphed  him  that  she 
was  going  home.  He  came  to  her  at 
once. 

"I  am  doing  what  I  know  to  be 
wrong/'  she  broke  out.  "I  am  neg 
lecting  my  family." 

"You  are  doing  what  your  medical 
adviser  orders." 

"Yes,"  she  answered,  "but  can  you 
guarantee  that  nothing  will  happen 
in  my  absence?  \Yill  it  be  any  com 
fort  to  me,  if  things  go  wrong,  to  say 
that  I  was  obeying  orders?" 

He  did  not  directly  answer  this 
question,  which  had  been  largely 
rhetorical  in  intention.  Instead,  he 
said: 

"Yes,  I  suppose  you  are  dreadfully 
bored." 

She    checked    an    impulse    toward 

[35] 


THINGS 

complete  denial.  He  had  stated  half 
the  truth.  She  was  bored,  but  she 
tried  to  make  him  see  that  there  was 
more  than  that  in  her  attitude.  He, 
a  man  and  a  bachelor,  could  hardly 
realize  how  serious  might  be  the  re 
sults  of  a  mother's  protracted  ab 
sence. 

He  had  at  times  a  trick — irritat 
ing  to  Mrs.  Royce — of  replying  to 
something  slightly  different  from  the 
thought  one  had  expressed.  He  did 
so  now. 

"And  if  they  do  miss  you,"  he  said, 
"won't  that  be  a  help?" 

Yes,  certainly,  it  would  be  a  help, 
and  it  was  perhaps  that  thought 
which  kept  her  on  day  after  day— 
the  thought  that  they  were  missing 
her  in  every  detail  of  life,  the  belief 
that  the  daily  service,  the  common- 

[36] 


THINGS 

place  sacrifice  of  an  existence  like 
hers  could  only  be  realized  by  its 
cessation. 

One  reward  she  had.  Her  books 
began  to  grow  more  interesting.  "It 
grows  better  as  you  get  into  it,"  she 
explained  to  one  of  the  nurses,  but  in 
her  heart  she  knew  the  improvement 
was  not  in  the  book. 

At  last  a  night  came  when  she  had  a 
dream,  more  poignant,  more  vivid 
than  any  material  message  could 
have  been — a  dream  of  disaster  at 
home.  She  was  not  a  superstitious 
woman,  but  the  impression  already 
in  her  mind  was  immensely  deep 
ened.  She  was  needed  at  home;  that 
was  her  place.  What  madness  it  had 
been  for  her  to  go  away,  and  what  a 
selfish  madness,  made  up  partly  of 
desire  to  rest  and  partly  of  a  wish 

[37] 


THINGS 

to  prove  Despard  wrong!  She  might 
have  cause  to  reproach  herself  for  the 
remainder  of  her  life.  She  could  for 
give  him  all  that  she  herself  had  suf 
fered,  removed  from  her  work,  de 
prived  of  all  occupation  and  happy 
home  activities,  but  if  anything  had 
gone  wrong  with  those  she  loved— 

That  very  afternoon  she  went 
home. 

Once  inside  her  own  gates  she  be 
gan  to  see  signs  of  her  three  weeks' 
absence.  Although  the  grounds  were 
nominally  her  husband's  charge,  the 
standards  since  her  departure  had 
evidently  been  lowered.  The  gutters 
were  but  half  cleared  and  the  gravel 
unraked.  The  appearance  of  the 
house  confirmed  her  fears.  The  win 
dow  curtains  had  not  been  changed. 
Sixty-two  dirty  window  curtains 

[38] 


THINGS 

seemed  to  her  to  offer  but  a  dreary 
welcome. 

In  spite  of  sunshine,  the  rainy-day 
door  mat  greeted  her,  left  from  the 
day  before,  which  had  been  rainy; 
and  the  brasses  of  the  door,  though 
not  actually  tarnished,  lacked  that 
elysian  brightness  on  which  she  her 
self  insisted. 

As  she  mounted  the  steps  two  of  the 
boys  came  running  up — hugging  and 
clawing  at  her  with  hands  on  wrhich 
she  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  lustrous 
veneer  of  dirt.  They  were  so  glad  to 
see  her;  and  little  Lewis  had  been  ill. 
Her  heart  stood  still — oh,  only  a  cold. 
Where  wras  he?  she  asked  them,  and 
when  they  said — oh,  horror! — out 
with  the  governess  in  the  pony  cart, 
she  sent  them  racing  after  him. 

The  darkest  forebodings  filled  her 

[391 


THINGS 

mind  as  to  what  she  would  find 
within.  She  rang  and,  after  an  in 
terval  too  long  by  several  minutes, 
Churchley  opened  the  door.  For  an 
instant  his  appearance  drove  all 
other  thoughts  away. 

"Why,  Churchley,"  she  cried,  "you 
have  been  putting  on  weight!" 

Churchley  acknowledged  the  impu 
tation  with  a  smile  that  approached 
dangerously  near  a  dimple. 

'Yes,  madame,"  he  said,  "I've 
taken  a  great  turn  for  the  better," 
and  he  asked  sympathetically  after 
her  own  health. 

She  made  no  answer,  but,  turning 
her  head  away  from  the  staircase,  in 
whose  crevices  she  had  already  de 
tected  faint  gray  lines  of  dust,  she 
moved  toward  the  library  door,  which 
Churchley  quietly  opened  for  her. 

[401 


THINGS 

She  saw  with  a  shock  that  the  ar 
rangement  of  the  furniture — an  ar 
rangement  sanctified  by  twenty  years 
of  habit — had  been  altered.  Two 
desks  had  been  drawn  near  the  win 
dows  without  any  respect  for  sym 
metry,  and  at  these,  back  to  back, 
her  husband  and  daughter  were 
sitting. 

That  Celia  should  bring  her  school- 
books  to  the  library,  though  un 
usual,  was  not  unnatural,  but  the 
sight  of  Royce  at  work  on  page  after 
page  of  foolscap  was  something  re 
quiring  an  explanation. 

The  room  was  perfectly  quiet  ex 
cept  for  the  scratch  of  his  pen  and 
the  ticking  of  the  clock;  and  Mrs. 
Royce  decided  that  she  would  stand 
there  silent  until  some  other  inter 
ruption  occurred.  It  could  not  be 

[41] 


THINGS 

very  long  before  a  servant  entered 
or  they  themselves  would  weary  of 
this  work. 

But  the  silence  continued.  Once 
Royce  took  out  a  book  and  glanced 
at  some  reference.  Once  Celia  got 
up  and  lighted  the  lamps  for  both, 
but  neither  of  them  spoke. 

For  a  long  time  Mrs.  Royce  stood 
there,  transfixed  by  a  curious  con 
viction  that  came  to  her  as  she 
watched — the  conviction  that  this 
silence  carried  with  it  a  more  per 
fect  companionship  than  all  her  long 
talks  with  her  husband  had  ever 
brought.  Of  course,  she  had  long 
since  realized  that,  as  gradually  as 
one  season  melts  into  another,  her 
relationship  to  her  husband  had 
changed  —  changed  inevitably,  she 
had  imagined,  from  the  poetry  of 

[42] 


THINGS 

first  love  into  something  that  re 
sembled  the  prose  of  a  business  part 
nership.  To  her  the  change  was  not 
altogether  to  be  regretted;  in  her 
eyes  the  business  of  being  the  head 
of  a  man's  house  and  the  mother  of 
his  children  was  still  charged  with 
the  romantic  idea.  But  for  the  first 
time  it  now  occurred  to  her  to  ask 
whether  the  change  had  been  equally 
satisfactory  to  him.  Ah,  she  ad 
mitted  that  a  certain  charm,  a  cer 
tain  stimulation  had  gone  from  their 
affection,  but  never  before  had  she 
thought,  as  she  was  thinking  now, 
that  the  quality  most  conspicuously 
absent  was  intimacy.  How  was  such 
a  thing  possible  when  she  had  lived 
twenty  years  of  her  life  with  him  in 
perfect  amity? 
Yet,  standing  there,  she  saw  that 

[431 


THINGS 

for  many  years  she  had  not  had  the 
least  conception  of  what  had  been 
going  on  in  his  mind.  She  had  used 
the  word  business  partnership,  and, 
naturally,  when  they  were  together 
they  often  discussed  the  details  of 
the  business,  only  now  she  remem 
bered  that  it  was  always  in  her  de 
partment  that  the  problems  for  dis 
cussion  arose.  Royce  seemed  to  be 
able  to  manage  his  end  of  it  without 
consultation.  Why  was  this? 

She  tried  desperately  to  see  the 
thing  clearly.  Her  whole  life  was 
built  on  the  belief  that  she  existed 
solely  to  be  depended  upon;  and 
yet  she  saw  that  her  husband,  in  all 
his  more  personal  interests,  far  from 
depending  on  her,  never  even  men 
tioned  them  to  her.  What  did  that 
mean?  And  why  had  she  never  ob- 

[44] 


THINGS 

served  this  contradiction  before? 
Could  it  be  that,  after  all,  she  was 
not  dependable,  or  had  some  un- 
reckoned  factor  in  his  life  rendered 
Royce  more  self-reliant  than  he  had 
been  in  the  early  days  of  their  mar 
riage? 

And  at  this  point,  before  she  re 
alized  her  intention,  she  heard  her 
own  voice  saying:  "Celia,  my  dear, 
your  lamp  is  flaring." 

Well,  there  was  no  question  of  the 
welcome  with  which  both  pairs  of 
eyes  lit  up.  "Mother,  dear!'9  cried 
the  girl.  Both  overwhelmed  her  with 
solicitude  about  her  health.  She  did 
not  have  to  ask  after  theirs.  Never 
were  two  rosier,  more  unlined  faces 
than  theirs. 

After  a  moment  she  asked  what  it 
was  that  her  husband  was  writing, 

[45] 


THINGS 

and  he  answered,  almost  timidly, 
that  it  was  a  book  on  trees;  he  had 
had  the  idea  in  his  mind  for  a  num 
ber  of  years  but  had  never  had  the 
energy  to  begin  it  before. 

"Why  not?"  she  asked  almost 
sharply,  but  before  he  had  time  to 
answer — and  it  was  evident  he  him 
self  had  no  idea  of  the  real  answer 

— Celia  broke  in: 

"And  what  do  you  think,  mother? 
I've  won  the  prize  for  composition 
at  school.  I  had  the  idea  the  very 
night  you  went  away,  and  I've 
worked  and  worked  over  it,  and  they 
all  say  that  it  is  much  better  than 
anything  I  ever  did  before.  Aren't 
you  glad?" 

Yes,  her  mother  was  glad,  but  a 
strain  of  bitterness  mingled  with  her 
rejoicing.  Was  it,  indeed,  her  ab- 

[46] 


THINGS 

sence  that  had  released  all  the  vital 
energy? 

One  hope  lingered  unacknowledged 
in  her  breast.  She  turned  to  her 
husband. 

"And  have  they  made  you  com 
fortable  since  I  went?"  she  asked. 

"Oh,  perfectly,"  he  replied.  "Ev 
erything  has  gone  without  a  hitch, 
thanks  to  your  arrangements." 

"Yes,"  Celia  chimed  in,  "the  ser 
vants  have  been  too  wonderful; 
they've  done  everything  just  as  if 
you  were  at  home,  only  better." 

Mrs.  Royce  looked  round  the  room, 
where  to  her  eye  everything  was 
wrong — the  corners  dusty,  the  lamps 
ill-cared  for,  the  sofa  pillows  rum 
pled,  and  the  tea-tray,  which  ought 
to  have  been  removed,  still  standing 
disordered  in  a  corner. 

[47] 


THINGS 

She  stretched  her  hand  toward  the 
bell  to  ring  and  order  it  taken  away; 
and  then,  checking  herself,  she  sank 
back  and  folded  her  hands  idly  in 
her  lap.  Her  husband  had  begun  to 
tell  her  something  about  his  book. 


48] 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
BERKELEY 

Return  to  desk  from  which  borrowed. 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


1947 

251^5  IAD 
Illicit*1 

5Sep'55PW 


DEAD 


JUN    219728 


MAY  2972 -lP»  48 


LD  21-100m-9,'47(A5702sl6)476 


C03111117M 


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THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


